Author: Nazia Jannat

Writers are strange in that they reverberate off one another. We are all types of whales and it is influence and drama and jealousy and love and admiration that keep our worlds going round. In this way, language becomes cyclical in motion. And it’s something I haven’t given much thought to, until taking classes here at Columbia. Sure the beginning my undergraduate experience was a mess but growing through the years not only made me a better procrastinator, but a better academic and critic. Ok fine, I’m a terrible procrastinator on occasions like now but that’s not the point! Reading the western (white) cannon over and over again bored me to the point of returning back to biochemistry. But the class readings didn’t end there. It was only when I immersed myself in poetry that I finally “got it.” The “it” I’m referring to is community, is continuity, is inspiration through life and death. Advertisements

I winged my way into grad school. Yup, you heard me crystal clear. I didn’t prepare for the GRE, I took a nosedive into the process during senior year of college, my fucking submission packet fucking came in late after the fucking deadline, I only applied to 3 schools, and I definitely didn’t try for fully funded magical realms like Iowa. Instead, I poured my heart out and took a chance on the little things that made me weird. While I’m not as weird (or funny) as my role model Al Yankovic, there are still a couple of peculiarities I’m comfortable admitting.